Three AM in Brooklyn
by magenta.revival
Summary: Amy Santiago is up late and thinking about the way her life has gone.


His shoulders were quaking a little as he tried to hide the fact that he was crying. Her fingers tightened around one of them, trying to calm him down. It was dark in the room, and his eyes were shining up at her and looking a little wild.

She stared back a little longer than either of them might have allowed during the day. If she'd seen those eyes, once, though, she'd seen them a thousand times. They were the stable thing in his face, squinting or widening a little, but mostly staying lazily half open under playfully arching eyebrows. She could see the stress in the flatter lines on his forehead, but even in a moment of panic they refused to look awake. Maybe it was the darkness. The almost amber of the outer ring of his iris was nearly obscured as his pupil opened to the small light across the room.

It was strange, maybe, to sit and meet his eyes like this when he was so afraid. She'd gotten used to it, though. This was the third time this week that he'd half-roused in panic and been frantic for someone to hold him together. His hair had been growing long, lately, and it slopped and curled around her face. The darkness of it surprised her for a moment, then made her smile as she remembered.

His face was relaxing, and his breaths slowed from heaving against her chest. She felt a shudder go through him. She wondered whether he'd heard, but there were almost certainly footsteps approaching from down the hall. But his breathing continued to calm, and soon he was lolling against her again as she lay awake in the darkness. Another few nights staying alert with him. She smiled, and was surprised to find that her eyes were watering a little.

She was losing her chances to hold him like this, his limbs all curled against her. During the days he was all nervousness and sharp movements. He was angular and bony, but tonight he softened at the edges, just a little. He woke a little and nuzzled his nose further into the crook of her neck. She wondered if the affection this week was nothing more than a side effect of the drugs. Whatever it was, she knew the score. She wasn't the one he wanted, usually, but she couldn't deny that this was nice.

He'd left the badge pinned to his chest, and it made her smile to see it winking in the almost blackness. He found it so fierce, she didn't have the heart to tell him that it was funny. The sight of it rising and falling with his breaths took her back to the days of Jake Peralta, boy genius. But he was gone, and it made her a little sad to think about it.

And she was sitting in the dark with a still vaguely frightened body draped over hers. She could remember the days when it was Jake's arms and Jake's legs and Jake startling easily in poorly lit city corners. She remembered the way he'd tried to control his breath after running, and how the hissed gasps had smelled like watermelon gum. It made her laugh now, wondering if she'd ever smell that weird aroma again.

She was hoping she might.

The room was lit, briefly, and she heard a dim voice in another room before the peal of the thunder. He stiffened under her fingers and curled his body, squeezing her hands. She whispered something in her ear, feeling awful that he was sick and scared and drowsy from the cough syrup. She felt awful only because it was nice to have a moment when she wasn't half-waiting for him to hit her or shout or break something.

She loved him, but she got tired, sometimes.

Finally, the footsteps halted outside the door, and she twisted to look behind her. Two half-opened eyes stared back at her sleepily from behind glasses that were sliding down a long, crooked nose. Another flash of lightening lit the room, and he moved quickly, pulling his arms into his body bracingly.

Jordan whimpered, and he shushed her tiredly, then turned to smile at his wife.

"How's Judah doin'?"

"He's okay. Little sleepy. It's keeping him from being too scared. He fell asleep with his badge on again"

"Well that'll make you brave"

"Or stupid"

"Or sexy"

"Or obnoxious" She took the baby from his arms as he knelt next to his son.

"Yeah, that too" Judah was finally asleep, and his father picked him up easily and lowered him onto his sheets again.

"He's down for the count again"

"He'll be chasing the bad guys again at six in the morning, I'm sure" His smile was so proud it almost hurt.

"Do you miss it?" She didn't want him to see how much she worried about it. She didn't want him to know the reason why she always tried to wake up before him, diffuse the problem before it woke him, do something to help him.

He leaned back on his heels, surveying his wife, daughter, and sleeping son dressed in a police captain's outfit.

"I figure a boy needs his dad, right? I'm a good dad. I like being that."

She marveled a moment at how _natural_ it was on him. The way his oversized hands held the baby, wiped noses, spooned Cheerios…Fatherhood had settled well on Jake Peralta. Standing there in the dark, he looked calm and certain and…_happy_. He looked like he'd finally found something he'd lost a long time ago. She shivered as he leaned in close and murmured in her ear

"Besides. What would the nine-nine do without their fearless leader?"

His lips wet the skin behind her ear, and the words cooled it and gave her goosebumps. She reached and found his bony shoulder in the dark, pulling it to her. It was hard, with Jordan between them, and the kiss slowly became a laugh.

She was, in that moment, totally happy. Captain Amy Santiago, laughing in the middle of the night with a sleepy Jake Peralta, their rambunctious son, and tiny baby daughter. This was the way it should have been forever.

He seemed to be reading her thoughts.

"Thank you, Amy"

"For what?"

"For giving me a family"


End file.
